Dead Dog's Tale

Nina stood at the edge of the rooftop, her bare, itchy feet numb against the icy concrete. The wind howled around her, biting at her skin, but her body remained frozen, no longer able to feel the cold. She’d run so far, escaped so much, but here she was again—alone, cornered, staring down into the abyss. Her life had always felt like a series of endless escapes. From the day she was seven, clutching her doll as her mother and father’s car flipped and rolled on that highway in Manila, their screams echoing in her memory. Afterward, the foster homes—each one worse than the last—until she ran from them too, straight into the heart of New York City’s merciless streets. Homeless, forgotten, invisible. She had become adept at blending into the shadows, a ghost among the bustling crowd of people who couldn’t, or wouldn’t, see her. But ghosts witnessed things, didn’t they? And one night, at a familiar haunt in a filthy alley near the river, she had seen too much. The woman’s face was still etc...